Wedding Etiquette Forum

and guest or not for small wedding (complicated)

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Re: and guest or not for small wedding (complicated)

  • I have a very similar situation! My partners aunt is dating a married man, but as far as I am supposed to know they aren't dating. Fun, huh? I am going to give her a guest and hope she doesn't use it. It is doing the right thing but since it is so hush hush I doubt she would bring him (and all of her family will be there, I doubt she will be lonely)
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  • wyneywyney member
    10 Comments
    edited April 2011
    The most gracious thing to do when you aren't up to date on a guests marital/dating status is to ask if they are dating anybody* and then invite them by name...as 'and guest' is rude when you could have found out their names.  I don't always agree with this, because I think it's more gracious to host a guest of their choosing rather than choose their guest.

    If you aren't calling all of your other guests who you don't talk to as frequently, I wouldn't extend this only to her.

    If she is dating him, it would be your faux pas not to invite him. 

    If you want to follow the school of thought that says guests in a relationship must have their SO's invited, then you must invite him....IF you know she is dating him. 

    If you don't invite him because he is married to someone else, you are judging their relationship.

    Personally, I think some judgment is fine.  I would draw some lines.  For me, that would be not feeling obligated to invite dates for guests that weren't firmly established when the invitations were printed.  Or inviting secret lovers.

    If you want to follow etiquette and invite the SOs of all of your guests, you could just ask her if she's seeing anyone she'd like to bring.  I would be careful not to make her feel accused or singled out.

    Edited:

    I personally think there are far worse offenses than not inviting people you don't know to your wedding....SOs of guests or not.  If she knows other people there, and it really is a small wedding where friends and family are being cut off the guest list I don't think it's that inconsiderate.  But I can be a little iconoclastic about some etiquette rules and traditions and couldn't ever be bothered to be offended if FI were not invited to a wedding with me so long as I wasn't hauling my buns OOT to sit awkwardly at a table without friends.
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